


Hurt Someone

by invisibledeity



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Hallucinations, M/M, PTSD, Poor Prompto, Referenced Torture, alcohol as a bad coping mechanism, everything is pain, healing isn't easy, mentions of Noctis, referenced self-harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-07
Updated: 2017-07-07
Packaged: 2018-11-29 00:45:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11429643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/invisibledeity/pseuds/invisibledeity
Summary: 'This is a kindness', Ardyn whispers, fresh in his ear like he’d never left that cell in Gralea.Prompto’s had more than a decade to try and come to terms with the idea of empathy, of forgiveness, and he just can’t do it. Every attempt just makes him want to claw his eyes out, just adds another mark to the canvas alongside his ever-present barcode. His body is littered with sins.For some people, forgiveness is a word that only means pain.





	Hurt Someone

**Author's Note:**

> It wouldn't be as easy as Prompto hoped to get the idea of Ardyn out of his mind. I wanted to explore that a little.
> 
> And I mean, I do think Ardyn can have some kind of forgiveness. Just not from my Prompto :P
> 
> You should all listen to Go by OSI, by the way.

 

He’s in a bar in Lestallum. It’s hot and sticky and cloying, and the day’s been a long one. So much to do. Nice that it’s over. It’s summer and the sun is bright and he should love this fact but it only makes the shadows look longer. Doesn’t feel good.

            So Prompto’s taken a detour into the bar, diving into the shade. Better when everything’s dark, can’t see the shadows that way. Stop analysing it. Get a drink.

            The room’s dingy and it’s abuzz with conversation. Still hard, these days, to get used to the liveliness, the noise. Been years now since the darkness ended. Years without Noctis, years without the fear of daemons. Well, provided he stay awake.

            He doesn’t like focussing on other people’s words. And he doesn’t talk as much as he used to. Things changed since the world fell apart: the world became louder, but he got older and sadder. Still tries to be happy for everyone else but that front gets let down when he’s alone and the guard comes back up. He wishes he wouldn’t hyperfixate on everything.

            He orders a whisky, no ice, no concern for the brand, and he’s staring it down, inhaling the bitter scent, when he overhears people talking at a nearby table. He hears the name, _Ardyn_ , and he freezes, a rabbit in headlights.

            _Relax, man, c’mon._ Of course they’d be talking about him. It wasn’t that weird, not after Ignis had worked so hard to get the truth out. Who Ardyn was, why this all happened. Everything. As Ignis had said, _Letting this piece of history be forgotten would only achieve more sorrow all the sooner. We must not allow a repeat._

And then of course he thinks of the words Noctis spoke at the Citadel, before the end. _He’s been living so long in a world he could share with no-one._

            Prompto’s had more than a decade to try and come to terms with the idea of empathy, of forgiveness, and he just can’t do it. Every attempt just makes him want to claw his eyes out, just adds another mark to the canvas alongside his ever-present barcode. His body is littered with sins.

            He wants to drown out the noise around him. Swallows a gulp of whisky all too fast. But the alcohol fuzz isn’t strong enough yet to block out the next words he hears. Words that curdle his blood.

            ‘He was just misunderstood.’

            _No no no no no._

            ‘Uh, I guess he did set himself up as the bad guy.’ The guy’s friend sounds uncertain, but open to the idea.

            ‘Yep - all so the King could have a way to end the Scourge.’

            _The King,_ Prompto thinks bitterly. _His name was Noctis._

            ‘And I mean I can hardly blame him for wanting revenge after what Bahamut did.’

            ‘He could’ve done much worse. If he was actually a megalomaniac or somethin’.’

 _You guys have no idea_ , he thinks.

            ‘Like the Emperor?’

            ‘Yeah. But he didn’t declare war. Everything he did was to make the King strong enough to end it all.’

            ’S’pose you’re right.’

            _Don’t agree with him!_ Prompto recoils into his mind a little further. He knows this is sort of true, and it kills him inside. Ardyn, building them up in the cruellest way possible so they could have the power to take him down.

            The conversation continues.

            ‘In a way, he was kind.’

            _He hurt me._

            ‘Weird way to show it.’

            ‘Yeah, but like I said. Misunderstood.’

            Prompto focusses very hard on the space in front of him, the middle-distance between the bar’s mucky countertop and the row of booze bottles on the shelf beyond. His blood’s still curdling.

            _This is a kindness,_ Ardyn whispers, fresh in his ear like he’d never left that cell in Gralea. He’s circling behind him, teasing, taunting, messing with him. But those words; he also means it. Truly, utterly means it. Ardyn thinks he _needs_ this.

            Ardyn slows to a stop in front of him. He’s not all there, shimmering in a ghost haze in front of him, standing half-in half-out of the bar like a badly-rendered videogame model.

            ‘You’re dead,’ Prompto hisses, and his voice comes out angry.

            ‘You what, mate?’ The barkeeper’s looking at him curiously.

            ‘Uh, nothing. Sorry.’ Prompto grimaces, avoids the man’s eye. The barkeep responds by asking if he needs another drink, and when he gets no reply he simply leaves the bottle of whisky beside him. A flag to the world that Prompto’s another sore searcher for enlightenment at the bottom of a glass.

            They’re still talking, those fellow patrons at the nearby table. Ardyn’s still there. Prompto’s thoughts bubble up and his ribs tense like tight metal bands are constricting them. Too much, too strong, and he wants to lash out. Break the bottle. Destroy everything.

_He touched me/he bruised me/he put me on display._

_Hung me up to languish on that cross in the darkness while he toyed with the one I loved._

_He fed me my fears/made me swallow my pride._

_He injected me with a cocktail of emotions and played them like piano keys. on/off, up/down, hammering into chords and dissonance and it was all so sharp and off-key and even now I can’t get the tainted blood out of my veins._

            The long-dead man in front of him reaches through the solid table top and puts a translucent hand warmly, gently, over his own.

            _It was for your own good. Don’t forget: this is a kindness._

            He stares him down, and Ardyn smiles all wide and friendly and it’s damaging, it sears along old scars like a bright branding iron.

            ‘It’s not a kindness,’ he whispers back, seething through gritted teeth. ‘So shove it.’

_Oh? Why is it that you never appreciate my presents?_

He’s fixated on the wood panelling on the dirty bar countertop before him and he’s addressing Ardyn in his mind instead of out loud. He doesn’t want the barkeep to catch his eye again. He doesn’t want the people nearby to hear. He’s thinking _it’s all you, it’s always only you._

_It doesn’t matter who I sleep with. I see your face in all of them. You’re always hiding just beneath their skin. Ready to slip out of your disguise and interrupt their sweet nothings with your poison. Yeah, that’s it, isn’t it? Poison slipping between your teeth and past mine, icing my veins like cake frosting and just as sickly._

_you did this out of love_

The thought repeats, and oh god it hurts.

_you did this out of love_

 

            There’s a guillotine hovering up above him and he’s all strung up and he can’t shy away. A flash of silver - _quicksilver, that’s your name, don’t hide from it Prompto -_ and the metal lances through softness, tears at tendons, cleaves meat from bone, guts him like a fish.

            He’s staring down his empty glass. He wipes his eyes, pours another drink, downs it in one, and leaves the safe hollow of the watering-hole.

            Back to the sunlight with its long shadows. Sun flashes into his eyes as he walks from awning to awning, down narrow streets and under archways, round the side of tall terracotta apartments and up cobbled steps. Breaking from cool shade to hot sunbeat pathways. It’s his personal nadir, a landscape of light lanced through with dark, and he’s pretty sure Ardyn’s walking alongside him. Right where he belongs.

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to include something in a world where ordinary citizens had been educated and informed about what had gone on with Ardyn. I think this is the kind of thing Ignis would have been keen on educating folks about.


End file.
